Unraveling truth and myth in the life of character actor Stanley Fields. Born Walter L. Agnew, you’ll know him from Cimarron, Little Caesar (1931), Island of Lost Souls (1932), Algiers (1938), and several other major 1930s Hollywood releases.
Terror Aboard (1933) – Grand Hotel of Murder on the High Seas
One passenger drops after another in Terror Aboard (1933), Paramount’s pre-Code preview of the far-off slasher genre. An all-star cast of B-players is led by John Halliday in this tale of multiple murders at sea.
City Streets (1931) Starring Gary Cooper and Sylvia Sidney
A look at the most stylized of the 1931 gangster movies, Rouben Mamoulian’s City Streets (1931) from Paramount, starring Gary Cooper and Sylvia Sidney.
Her Man (1930) Starring Helen Twelvetrees and Phillips Holmes
Tay Garnett’s Her Man from Pathe is an overlooked pre-Code classic starring Helen Twelvetrees in the first screen adaptation of the Frankie and Johnny ballad. With Phillips Holmes, Ricardo Cortez and Marjorie Rambeau.
RKO’s Hell’s Highway (1932) Beats Other Chain Gang Movie to Theaters
It’s tempting to call RKO’s Hell’s Highway (1932) a knockoff on I Am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang. However the Richard Dix movie came first. A long essay looking at Hell’s Highway, Dix, the Etude Ethiopian Chorus and that other Chain Gang movie.
